A Liberating Elixir?



A Liberating Elixir?  Over the last several months, I have wondered in print how long it would take for moderate Democrat leaders to speak up regarding this administration’s shenanigans.  Like many, I have marveled at how invested the Democratic Party had become in the One and his uncanny ability to win political races.  Perhaps a perfect storm is developing that will finally push some of these folks to step up, call this bunch of White House political hacks out on their behavior, and restores at least a shred of integrity to their party.  It may have to wait until a potential debacle occurs in the mid-terms, but the storm is coming; and it will not arrive one day too soon.

There can be no doubt that the Democratic Party has been hijacked by a very liberal wing of the party.  Even though they represent a minority of the membership, they are certainly the tail wagging the dog.  As many have lately written, the traditional constituency of the Democrats has been replaced with a collection of pie slices that co-exist in the same pan but somehow never realize that they are baked together.  The challenge of holding this fragile bakery product together with its conflicting interests and agendas is fraught with peril and is a balancing act well worth watching.  To a very large extent, Obama and his political ilk have been the architects of this recipe; but their time in the kitchen is rapidly coming to an end and they apparently not very interested in leaving an orderly environment in their wake.  They have created a mess in every corner, have done little if any mopping up, and don’t even think about cleaning off the counters and tables.  They will be leaving WDC with grease on the appliances, flour on the floor, and the sink full of dirty dishes.

Obama’s abysmal failures in the economy, the global order, and the legislative arena are now very obvious to everyone, devoid of any fall guys (Bush anyone?) to blame, and the hopey/changey bullshit has run its course.  His narcissistic obsession with his, and only his, vision of the way things ought to be is rapidly becoming as uninviting to members of his own party as they have always been to Republicans and most Independents.  Couple the sheets being pulled back on his executive performance with the list of his wannabe cabinet members and their misadventures and you have a devil’s brew that is undrinkable for many reasonable Democrats in the House and the Senate.  Perhaps the straw that will break the camel’s (donkey’s?) back is Obama’s apparent disregard for any limit to his executive authority and actions and his apparent disregard for any semblance of respect or dialogue with Congress.  His quest for supreme power has become so naked that many Democrats have finally decided to break their silence and call him out for the incompetent that he is. 

The mid-term elections are still a lifetime away, but if it continues to look like a Republican wave in November, look for more and more Democrats to begin jumping ship on this lame duck cruise.  And if, in fact, the Republicans gain control of the Senate this fall, don’t be surprised if a significant handful of Senate Democrats decide it is in their best interest, and in the best interest of this nation, to begin working across the aisle with McConnell instead of the clown in the White House.  Finally, Obama’s rhetorical and ridiculous chickens are coming home to roost and perhaps Democrats are finding this an opportune time to find their own long-lost voices; Obama’s cavalcading failures may prove a powerful liberating elixir for some Democrats who remember they should be serving the people instead of the buffoon on Pennsylvania Avenue.   

Let's Get Horizontal.



Let’s Get Horizontal.  Can we not just apply this general principle of our private lives to our government?  Do our beaurucrats simply fail to grasp the common wisdom of the horizontal over the vertical?  I don’t know about that, but I do know this: if our government gets much more vertical, the moon will be in jeopardy of being poked.

It is not reasonable to expect that government can operate without a certain amount of inefficiency and lack of empathy.  By its very nature, government will always duplicate, waste, and be out of touch with its citizenry…to a certain degree.  The amount of that degree is where the focus needs to be.  And that begs the question: Which form of government structure keeps that degree to a minimum, vertical or horizontal?  How you view this question and which you deem to be the proper response speaks a good deal about whether you are a conservative or a liberal.

In the last six years, we have seen a massive amount of vertical integration in our government; and it is fair to say that process is likely to continue on an accelerating path over the next two and a half years.  More and more, whether you are in or out of the government, we are seeing less autonomy, less decision making, and less substantive input at the local level and more of all this power and authority flowing upwards to the federal level.  Now without a doubt, there are instances where a federal dictate is necessary for the purposes of uniformity in implementation and maintenance.  But it also true that the closer government resides to the people, the more reflective and responsive it will be to their concerns and desires. 

The nanny state environment sought by today’s liberal establishment requires vertical integration of government.  It requires that your local federal representatives rely on their central state office for marching orders; and that those state federal offices rely on their WDC department officials for their marching orders.  This type of setup permits WDC to keep the maximum amount of program administration directly under their thumb and under their control.  It effectively removes the discretionary authority of local officials that, while on occasion is clearly abused and corrupted, allows our government to relate and respond to the voters and allows our government to serve our vast and diverse populace in a fair and equitable manner.

When political parties argue about limited government, the emphasis is almost always placed on WDC.  Sometimes it bleeds down to the regulatory impacts at the state level.  But rarely do we broaden the discussion enough to encompass the question of the vertical versus the horizontal.  Whether you choose to support a limited government or an expanded government, it only makes sense that you support a horizontal government.  The more autonomy that is exercised by your local government officials makes the policy exercised by those people more accessible to you.  We all feel estranged from our government and that leads to voter apathy and disillusionment.  If we are to be involved with our democracy, we need to be within grasp of our government; we need to be able to reach out and touch our government.  And if we are fortunate enough to actually find that government representative to reach out and touch, they need to be sufficiently empowered to respond in a meaningful way to our questions, concerns, and desires.  You can get into trouble, serious trouble, with both the vertical and the horizontal.  But at the end of the day, don’t we all know that getting horizontal is the only way to roll?

Can't You See That This Emperor Has No Clothes?



Can’t You See That This Emperor Has No Clothes?  Obama is a remarkable president.  Remarkable in that he focuses so much on himself and so little on our nation’s business.  Remarkable in his ability to construct straw men to knock down when setting forth his questionable policies.  Remarkable in that while serving midway through this second term as president, he continues to campaign and fund-raise as if he were on the ballot this fall.  Remarkable in the way he takes such a cavalier approach to foreign policy while maintaining such a laser focus on his pet domestic rhetoric.   Remarkable in the fashion that on almost every single issue, his message is one that divides and highlights our differences, as opposed to our mutual concerns and characteristics.  Remarkable in the fact that his total emphasis is on his vision of how this world should be, not about how the world is or how it got that way, or how it might change in a democratic and constructive manner.  Remarkable in how he trumpets his honesty and transparency while consistently deceiving, telling partial truths, and hiding the machinations of his administration from the public.  Remarkable in how he selects his appointees not from a pool of highly qualified Democrats, but from liberal ideologues with no practical experience and devoid of ethics.  And I think most of all, remarkable in how he has utterly no concept of accountability and gleefully fiddles while Rome burns; blithely golfing, vacationing, posing, and playing the star, while the times cry out for a leader that can unite our government, be a voice for freedom and justice in this uncertain world, and set an example for our society.

“It is Bush’s fault” has outlived its shelf life.  Although it remains reticent, deficient in its obligation, bereft of any integrity, and complicit in its conspiratorial consequences, the mainstream media does not fawn as much as it once did; even they are finally realizing that the “hope and change” glow has faded.   Never in my lifetime of sixty plus years have I seen a President perform in this fashion; with such utter disregard for neither the sanctity of the office nor the importance of the job description.  Is it any wonder that our society, from top to bottom, from grade school to Wall Street, from rich to poor, from California to Kentucky to New York, has adopted his philosophy and refuses to accept the wages of their own behavior, choices, and decisions?  Accountability...What the hell is that?    If Obama can do one thing, call it another, and get no apparent pushback in the media, then why should we as citizens worry about dealing with reality?  This “get it while you can” mentality has become pervasive in our country and although it has always existed to some extent, there is absolutely no question that Obama has dramatically increased its presence in our population and the lack of shame that accompanies its display. 

It is pathetic to see a President behave with this lack of seriousness.  It is equally pathetic to see our national media acquiesce in this debacle.  It is sad to see our country devolve as a democracy and a just society.  It is dangerous to see America become irrelevant in global affairs and to see evil men filling the vacuum left by our malfeasance.  But most of all, it is just wrong, in so many ways, to see our institution of government devalued in such a fashion and to see the citizenry losing respect for it.  Although many symptoms will disappear and many aliments will go away when Obama finally leaves office, the damage done to this nation by this administration will take generations to repair.  

The World We Live In vs. The World We Want



The World We Live In vs. The World We Want.  It occurred to me this morning while reading about AG Holder and gun control and tracking bracelets, that he (AG Holder) is the perfect example of liberal philosophy in government.  Now to anyone who is paying attention to the world today, this comes as no surprise.  But my point is that his department represents a microcosm of the greater government and his exercise of this liberal philosophy is much easier to see in that narrow context.

I think it boils down to a simple point: Liberals in government…true liberals, not moderate Democrats, who I believe remain increasingly uneasy (even though they still won’t admit it) with the direction that liberals are taking this nation…are so enthralled about being in a position of effective authority that they focus almost all of their resource on making the world a vision of what they think it should be, at the expense of not doing their job and dealing with the reality of the way the world actually is.  Now if it was possible to put this country on cruise control while full attention was given to rhetoric, gamesmanship, and visionary bloviating, then it might even be beneficial to have the full-time debate about which philosophy (conservative or liberal) is best for this nation’s government.  But the fact is that government has a function.  That function is to administer the laws that exist; to maintain the justice system in our nation; to do our part in a global effort towards peace and prosperity for all; and to improve our government by addressing areas of failing and areas of new need that evolve with the times.  To ignore these primary functions of government runs the risk of our nation sliding into disarray; losing sight of exactly who we are as a nation, what our ideals are, and exactly what our place in the world is.  You know…that pretty well describes where we are right now, doesn’t it?

It can be argued that conservatives, in their quest for smaller government, are sometimes guilty of insufficient bureaucratic ambition.  There are absolutely some things that the federal government is best suited to do and it needs to step up in those instances.  On the other hand, the liberal quest for the nanny state where mother nation provides all things to all people is certainly not the nation our founders envisioned.  The certitude that today’s governing liberals hold in excess blinds them to the damage they are doing by ignoring the atrophy of governmental competence under their watch.  They are so anxious to move on to their ideal model that they ignore the pressing need to take care of today’s business.  I think it fair to state that when judging the methods used by liberals and conservatives, conservatives tend to take a more piecemeal approach while liberals take a more sweeping one.  I think it also fair to say that each side could improve their methods by taking a small dose of their opponent’s philosophy and using it to season their own.